


Abandon

by heyHEYOhSorry



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: AU after Speed Force, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2017-12-20
Packaged: 2019-02-17 12:40:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13077066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heyHEYOhSorry/pseuds/heyHEYOhSorry
Summary: At age six her mother abandoned her, after that it seems like everyone she loves will eventually leave her too.





	Abandon

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after Barry goes into the Speed Force, but is pretty AU after that.
> 
> Only T because G didn't seem to fit the mood of this.

42 days after Barry walked into the Speed Force there are 11 failed attempts to bring him back.

After the first failed 3 times, Cisco doesn’t bother to get the hopes up of Joe and Wally.

It’s late on the 45th day, close to midnight, when Cisco attempts trial number 12. This failed attempt ends in a loud combustion and small fire.

It isn’t until he’s managed to stomp out the flames, does he notice Iris standing in the Cortex doorway.

She looks much smaller without her commander heels, and her arms wrapped tight around her body.

It’s the first time Cisco has seen her in weeks. Cisco wonders if Iris often comes here at night, if she also feels close to Barry here.

“Be careful, Cisco.” Iris’s voice is weak, rusty from days of going unused. “We can’t afford to lose anyone else.”

And as quietly as she entered, she leaves.

//

 

When Cisco swings by her cubicle at the CCPN, and says, “Just figured we’d get lunch” Iris automatically lifts an eyebrow in skepticism.

Over the 4 years that Iris has known Cisco not once has he visited her at her office.

There’s an energy about him as he stands there. A similar energy he has when he’s about to open a portal. It’s unnerving. Iris would prefer to know right now what it is Cisco has to tell her, what’s the urgent news technology wiz Cisco Ramon doesn’t want to deliver through text.

But in the middle of a giant media hub is not the location.

“Hey Linda, I’m going to take a half-day.” She says, as she packs up her stuff into her over-the-shoulder bag.

“Everything alright?” Linda asks, as though Iris has to be handled. Even though it’s been two years since the inexplainable disappearance of her fiance.

“I’ll see you tomorrow.” Iris smiles and gives her friend a quick hug, before heading out with Cisco. She can’t tell Linda everything is alright. She won’t lie to her friend.

 

//

 

They do get lunch. And they don’t go to Big Belly Burger, instead opting for a vegan place Iris loves and Cisco hates. But Cisco offered and that’s the second clue that something big is about to happen.

She’s already run through a checklist of every reason she can think of, no one’s dead, Wally, her father, or Caitlin. S.T.A.R Labs is still standing. The sun is shining, the weather is warm, it’s another beautiful peaceful day in Central City.

“Well, are you going to explain this unexpected visit?” Iris asks.

Cisco pauses from eating his burrito. There’s a large satisfied smile on his face, which does nothing but tighten the knot in Iris’s stomach.

“I fixed it. I can bring Barry back.” Cisco declares.

 So this again. “Cisco--”

“No Iris. This is real this time. I’ve gone over my math a hundred times. I-I wouldn’t be telling you this if I wasn’t sure.”

The sincerity in Cisco’s eyes is real, yet she can feel sense his nerves. There’s something else he’s not telling her.

“What’s the catch, Cisco?”

He doesn’t look at her when he drops the other shoe, but her heart still clenches at the words.

He had been dreading this part. “It’s not totally impossible.”

Iris shakes her head. “Yes it is.”

“Why don’t you want to try? Don’t you miss Barry?” the hurt and confusion in evident in his voice.

He feels dumb asking it, but this blank, cold, dismissal isn’t the reaction he expected. Cisco will be the first to admit that Iris has changed since Barry’s disappearance. They all have. But he expected a smile, or tears, or some type of joyous emotion. Iris gives him neither.

She looks back down and continues to eat her salad.

“I’ve had fiancés die before.”

 

//

For it to work, they need Caitlin to channel Killer Frost again.

The core has to be below freezing while moving, and Killer Frost is the only way to move freezing temperatures.

Caitlin knows it’s been three days since Cisco has told Iris, and yet Iris hasn’t once brought up the topic with her.

They’re in the kitchen preparing dinner when Caitlin decides to broach the topic.

“I can do it.” Leaning against the sink, staring at Iris’s back as she dices tomatoes.

Iris doesn’t stop her movements “No.”

“Iris.”

“No.”

For a minute the apartment is silent, minus the knife against the cutting board.

“Why can’t we have a pragmatic discussion about this.”

The cutting stops and Iris turns around. “Don’t you care about us, about me.”

The words come out furious and miffed.

It’s the closest Iris has gotten to addressing the relationship that’s built between her Caitlin.

It wasn’t easy for them to get to this point.

When Caitlin finally came back, they had fought about everything. About Caitlin’s loyalty, about her decision to run, to leave them when they had needed her the most. And then they fought about stupid things, small things either one of them could have brushed off, but instead they blew into bigger arguments.

And then one day it all came to head. There was yelling and screaming, and then there were tears, and then comforting. It had taken then the verge of killing each other to realize how similar they were.

From that point on things changed. They found a way to work with each other, and they became friends, and then roommates.

And yet, any outsider could see they were more than roommates.

Falling in love with a girl isn’t something Iris expected. Falling in love again wasn’t something Caitlin planned.

Caitlin tilts her head and gives Iris a sad smile, reaching out towards Iris and pulling her into her embrace, “It’s because I care for you that I have to do this.”

//

Killer Frost stays to help cool the device, but after she’s vanishes in a whirl of ice and snow.

“She might come back?” but even Cisco doesn’t sound convinced.

 

//

They do manage to bring Barry back. And then he leaves. And then he comes back. And then he leaves.

It’s a pattern that Iris should have seen coming from a man who can travel through time. Who _has_ to travel through time, who has a responsibility to people other than her.

Caitlin leaves and comes back too. It turns out that Killer Frost will always be a part of her, and as long as she is, Caitlin will have the urge to up and abandon her.

The cycle goes on for five years before Iris is tired of waking up in an empty bed.

 

//

She gives up on love, moves away, and throws herself into work.

 

She’s sitting at her desk at the BBC, when she hears his familiar American accent.

“Cisco?” Ten years has changed him. His black hair now has streaks of grey, that match his salt and pepper scruff. He’s dressed differently too, in a dress pants and a blue button down.

“Just figured we could get lunch, and I could you convince you to come back home.” Despite his maturity, he has the same boyish smile, and suddenly Iris’s heart realizes how much she’s missed her friend.

All of a sudden she can see it. Can see what had always been in front of her. Cisco Ramon. She could picture their life together. A simple life with her best friend, the person she can say has never abandoned her.

The one person who’s always loved her.

 

“Only if you promise to never leave me.”

“I never will.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure why I was in such an angsty mood, but it clearly transferred over into this piece.
> 
> Completely new writing style, but one I've always wanted to try out, so please leave me a comment of what you thought of this.
> 
> Thanks for reading


End file.
